


In every life

by Flammenkobold



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Angst, Drabble, Flash Fic, Humor, M/M, Schmoop, Stream of Consciousness, barrisonweek, or rather Flash flash fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-09
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-19 09:23:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,159
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5962216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flammenkobold/pseuds/Flammenkobold
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short fanfics written for Barrison Week 2016. Added not in time and not in order, but will be finished.</p><p>1. Prompt The Morning after: He didn't wake up to sunlight filtering through the window. Or to a warm and cozy feeling.<br/>2. Prompt Awkward Situations: In which the Reverse Flash returns and Barry isn't sure how he feels about that.<br/>3. Prompt Multiverse: Sometimes Barry doesn't know whether his universe is one of the better ones or not. Drabble.<br/>4. Prompt Threesome: Harry and Barry. God, he was never getting used to how ridiculous it sounded. The two of them. Of course it was never just the two of them, was it?<br/>5. Prompt Role reversal/Evil!Barry: All Eobard Thawne ever wanted was to be a hero. Time had other plans.<br/>6. Prompt The Free Day: This was their day of play pretend that they were anything but enemies.<br/>7. Valentine's Day: Eobard tries to find a Valentine's gift for Barry. Cisco is not helping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Morning After

He didn't wake up to sunlight filtering through the window lids. Or to a warm and cozy feeling. That were just things that books and tv shows wanted you to believe. The sky outside was still a dark gray, the color it took right before a new day. His ass was freezing and his face lying in a puddle of his own drool, his leg in something cold and sticky, and yeah, no, he wasn't contemplating what it is.

But there was someone next to him, warm and alive, and for whatever fucked up reason still wearing the face and the name of Harrison Wells. Not that it mattered, not that it ever did. The name and the face could change a thousand time over, have changed and will one day change again. What mattered was the essence of things. And this man at his side would always be Barry's antithesis. It wasn't something he or anyone could change. He hadn't wanted it to change in a long time either. And if anything time had thought him, it was that antithesis didn't have to mean enemy.

Waking up in bed next to this man, it was new, but not something that came unexpected. Not as much as it'd have been over a decade or two ago. But that had been a long time off and everything since then had been leading up to this. And here they were. Finally.

Finally on the same page in time, the same shared memories and from here on out they could make new ones that belonged to both of them, at the same time in their history. It was such a novel idea and it sparked something warm inside Barry's chest.

He reached out and ran his fingers through his partner's soft hair, down his long neck. Harrison grumbled in his sleep and turned his head slowly towards him. Such an act of vulnerability, when before any such approach would've been met with an instinctive attack. Nothing personal, just something so ingrained into the Reverse Flash's reactions that it would've come automatically.

This, here and now, was proof of how far they've come. How far they trusted each other these days.

Barry's hand found their way up the unruly curls on Harrison's head again, almost petting him. A smile crept up at that imagine. His own personal oversized house-cat. There was happiness bubbling up inside him, like carbon dioxide making it's way upwards in the sparkling wine they shared the evening before.

"What?" Harrison mumbled, his lips thin and his eyes only cracked open a bit. Barry kept carding his fingers through the soft hair, still in his grasps, thinking. Harrison kept watching him silently, waiting for him to answer.

"You said, I'd never be truly happy," Barry murmured and felt Harrison tense under his fingers. "Tell you what. You were wrong," he added calmly and watched Harrison's eyes widen slightly, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down twice. He allowed him to gather his own thoughts. Harrison propped himself up, until they were at eye level and studied him intently.

"I believe that what I said was aimed as much as myself as at you."

Barry's heart sank. "Yeah?" he asked softly.

"Yes." Harrison pushed Barry's hair out of his forehead, his fingers lingering on Barry's ear. He licked his lips and his eyes flickered to the side, before he turned his intense gaze back to Barry. "I also believe that I was wrong."

"Yeah?" Barry asked again, a lot more energetic this time, a smile spilling over the soft features of his face.

For the split of a second there was an expression on Harrison's face that could be best described at utter desperation and disbelief, like he still couldn't believe that they were here now. For a speedster a second was almost as long as a lifetime, but the look that followed it lasted even longer and so Barry focused on that. It was a sly smile, slightly crooked and wry, but it reached Harrison's eyes, making them crinkle with happiness.

"Barry, you know how much I hate admitting to being wrong," he murmured and the laughter that was stuck in Barry's throat broke free. He toppled them over, leaning over Harrison.

"Yes, I do. But you know, it has it's rewards for admitting to it."

Harrison raised an eyebrow. "And what kind of rewards are you talking about, Mr. Allen."

Barry laughed again, leaning down to bestow a quick, sweet kiss. "These kind of rewards, Dr. Wells."

Perhaps it was going to be a sunlit morning with warm and cozy feelings after all.


	2. Awkward Situations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the Reverse Flash returns and Barry isn't sure what to feel.

He'd been oddly restless for the past few days, like something was in the air, a charge running through everything. It was a whisper in the back of his head no matter what he did. Anticipation, in a way, even though he didn't know for what. It made him unexpectedly cheerful, unexplainably content. Not dissimilar to the feeling he had when waiting for Iris to come back home from a longer trip away. Like when he stood in front of Iron Heights and waited for his father.

It also kept him awake to ungodly hours. Not that he'd been a particularly deep sleeper before. So he dragged himself back to S.T.A.R labs, a futile attempt to find something to battle his insomnia. He stopped dead in his tracks upon seeing Dr. Wells in the lab, bent over one of the main consoles. He hadn't seemed to noticed Barry, still checking the data running over one of the monitors. It wasn't an unfamiliar sight, not even after they had freed Jesse. Still, there was something surreal about it tonight.

“Hey,” he greeted, cautiously. “I didn't think you'd be in.”

The man at the work station didn't flinch, but turned to him slowly, precisely. So add odds with the abrupt movements and dismissiveness he'd he'd grown accustomed to from Harry.

"Well this is awkward," Wells said, the upward tick of his lips giving the lie away. The hairs at the back of Barry's neck rose and every cell in his body screamed _run, Barry, run._

"Harry?"

"Mr. Allen?" And the intonation, the tilt of his head, the way he raised his eyebrow was more than familiar.

In a flash he was over at the other man's side, ready to attack. If he had needed another proof of who he was facing, the fast way in which he evaded Barry was a dead give away. Hatred and relief alike welled up inside Barry. The man who still wore Harrison Wells face gave him a an almost feral grin.

“Catch me,” he dared Barry.

The speed force was cackling between them, red and yellow intertwined. Broke apart when the Reverse Flash dashed out of the lab. Barry followed him. Couldn't not. He barely managed to keep up, but keep up he did. This time it was different than all of their encounters before, because it was an equal race so fast that everything blurred. Not that Barry could have taken in anything around him. His entire body was singing with the power that surged through him, golden light running through his veins, reacting to the red lightning following Eobard Thawne's wake.

They rounded another street, another house and straight through the stadium and finally, finally, Barry got hold of his arm. Yanked him back around into the nearest surface, only to be spun around and pressed back against it. Barry didn't let go and for the moment they were locked like this.

The speed force flickering between them, licking up their arms and torsos, always mingling.

“You were dead,” Barry screamed and used his anger to push his counterpart away, only to be pulled along. “You were erased from time.”

His anger was met with barely constrained calm. “I'm afraid, it doesn't work like that, Barry,” Eobard said, but it was still said with Harrison Wells' voice, low and confident. The voice of a man who'd never been real, always an illusion. And yet, yet, Barry had never known the real Wells and searched for traces of the man he'd known in Harry from Earth-2.

“Hasn't anyone told you? Some things are meant to happen and, if anything, time will ensure that they happen.”

“Like you?” Barry spat out, still clutching Harrison's – Eobard's – elbow.

“Like you _and_ me,” Eobard Thawne replied softly, the tone of his voice in contrast with the unshakeable belief in his eyes. God, had Barry missed it. This absolute surety with  which this man looked at him.

This wasn't the Eobard Thawne who just found out the decade Barry was from. This man was faster, more precise and infinitely more dangerous. Not least of all because there was still fondness in his intense eyes when he looked at Barry. This one was his equal in strength and speed. This one was his mirror. His true Reverse.

And for the first time in months Barry felt complete.


	3. Multiverse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes Barry doesn't know whether his universe is one of the better ones or not.

 

There is a universe where Harrison Wells is still alive. Where Barry's mother is still alive, too. Where Barry never became a superhero.

 

There is one where Eobard Thawne never tried to kill him. Where he wasn't erased from existence. Where they never met at all.

 

Neither of these universes are his, though. In his universe, his mother is dead and so is Harrison Wells. In his Eobard Thawne was erased from existence.

 

It's also the universe where they met. Where their lives are intricately interwoven.

 

Sometimes Barry wonders whether this makes it one of the better ones or not.


	4. Three Some

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry and Barry. God, he was never getting used to how ridiculous it sounded. The two of them. Of course it was never just the two of them, was it?

Barry and Harry. God, he was never going to get over how ridiculous that sounded. How ridiculous the whole situation was. Or that, dammit, relationship of theirs was. (How ridiculously happy it made him).

He never was good at these things. Not with Jesse's mother, nor with any other person he'd ever been together with. Hell, relationships of any kind weren't his forte. (The only exception was Jesse, always Jesse. The only thing he was good at).

Not that it was love. Not yet. Oh, who was he going to be kidding, it was. Would be one day enough for even him to be unable to describe it as anything else. (Not less, but there were so many words to misdirect and deny in the English language).

It was sex and adrenaline and an unusual source of comfort. Familiarity. In a way. (But was it Barry looking at something familiar or him looking at Barry and wishing for someone to recognize him?).

If only it wouldn't feel like there was always a shadow present. A third person lingering in the cracks between them. Never truly gone. Never real enough to be really there either. But there. (Always there. Edged into Barry's very bone. Into his DNA. Into the way he sometimes looked at Harry, even when they were having sex.)

And he'd have to live with it. Kiss it too. Kiss Barry until all he tasted was this brilliant, annoying young man. (Not the man who left his mark. Not the man who had sometimes looked like Harrison Wells. Who never was anything like him)


	5. heroes and villains

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All Eobard Thawne ever wanted was to be a hero. Time had other plans.

All Eobard Thawne ever wanted was to be a hero, to be like the Flash. To be the Flash. One of them anyway, the title passed along from one person to the next and by the time he was born, the identity of the first Flash obscured and buried by history. Records expunged by the reign of despots and madmen in the past centuries.

It was one of the things he wanted to find out. One of the things that drove him to time travel, finding out who the original Flash had been. To meet his hero in person, when he hadn't been dead for centuries.

Eobard had wanted to be a hero. He truly had. He had tried his hardest to be one too. And for a time he had been just that. It had never stopped him from researching time travel. Then, when he had finally figured out how to get back to the twenty-first century, that was when it all went to hell.

He'd found out that all his hard work, all his dreams were for nothing. Eobard Thawne wasn't meant to be a hero, or the Flash. He was meant to be the exact opposite. The reverse, some might say. The Flash had clearly thought so.

It wasn't like he hadn't tried to fight it. Fight his own destiny and time itself. But here was the funny thing. He could fight it, he did. Remained a hero.

Only to find out that when he did, the past changed. So did the Flashes destiny. Instead of being the hero Eobard remembered him to be, he became one of the worst villains history had seen. Oh, the Flash did start out as a hero, but then time, loss and fame and perhaps good intentions molded him into something else. Someone who nearly destroyed the future Eobard had grown so fond of and turned it into something covered in ashes and cinders.

It was like this then. The two of them. The Flash and the Reverse Flash. Always mirror images and always at opposition to each other.

Eobard hated him for it. Hated him for forcing that decision upon him. Hated him, because Eobard knew, that he would do everything, _everything_ to ensure his future happened. That the people he loved wouldn't have to suffer through the fallout of the Flashes fall from grace.

Becoming a villain, becoming the Flashes enemy was surprisingly easy. Killing came with an odd satisfaction, an odd comfort knowing that, if he had no power over his own life and destiny, then at least he had the power over the life of others.

Perhaps, perhaps he could also use that power to kill the Flash in time, before he was made, before he became a fixture in Eobard Thawne's own destiny.

Time, of course, had other plans.

It always did.


	6. The Free Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was their day of play pretend that they were anything but enemies.

Barry swung his legs back and forth, letting them dangle over the cliffs edge. The sun was already setting and it wouldn't be long before this day was over. He wished it would last longer, that he could make it last longer. Next to him Eobard shifted and leaned over, close enough for his breath to tickle Barry's ear. “You know, we could run back in time, repeat this day all over again,” he voiced Barry's own thoughts.

 

Barry smiled ruefully and squinted at the reflecting waves below him. Eobard warmth seeped through his thin shirt and he wanted to lean into it. Wanted a great many things more. Like turn his head and chase the soft puffs of air against the shell of his ear.

 

But he couldn't. Not even on this day, this one free day, where they pretended that they weren't enemies and all the horrible things that had happened between them didn't matter.

 

“No, we can't,” he licked his lips and amended, “I can't.”

 

Eobard leaned back. “Of course not.” He didn't sound disappointed and perhaps that was even worse.

 

“We'll always have next year,” Barry said, and couldn't keep the question out of his voice. Eobard shifted and a small rock came loose, skipping down to the ocean.

 

“Yes, we will at that,” and now there was something close to amusement in his voice. “Given we're both still alive.”

 

Barry balled his left hand to a fist and took a deep breath. “Yeah,” he whispered. He didn't want to think about that. About whatever came after today. If their hatred would finally outweigh those stolen moments, if the Reverse Flash did something Barry could not forgive. If, whatever lay ahead, would force one of them to kill the other.

 

“We still have a few minutes left,” Eobard reminded him and Barry nodded. God, how much he hated these days, how much he craved them. This terrible play pretend at being something other than what they were to each other, what they always would be. Those days where he allowed himself to let his connection to Eobard Thawne be something other than hatred. Because there were so many facets to their connection, hatred and disgust being only the most obvious once.

 

So Barry leaned back, settled his weight against Eobard and relished his soft little inhale full of surprise. Eobard looped an arm around him, almost tentatively and Barry loosely intertwined their fingers. It would be so easy to lean back further, to turn his head, to breach this last gap between them.

 

He wouldn't. Couldn't really. There was already too much guilt he would wake up to in the morning. Besides, if he turned his head now, if he stole that one kiss he so desperately craved, he wasn't sure he would be able to stop. If he could find his way out of the illusion they created on this day. Eobard wouldn't either. He'd wait for Barry to take that step.

 

Neither of them moved when the sun was finally swallowed by the sea.


	7. Valentine's Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eobard tries to find a Valentine's gift for Barry. Cisco is not helping.

"How am I supposed to know that he likes Valentines Day that much?" Eobard asked, slightly annoyed.

 

Cisco shrugged and thoughtfully chewed on his twizzler. "Don't know, man. Perhaps because you stalked him for over fifteen years."

 

Eobard threw him a deadly look. It would have been more intimidating if the guy hadn't been working on their side for five years now and done everything in his power to prove himself. Still, okay, maybe it was a little bit intimidating. Maybe it brought up bad memories. Memories of losing at Monopoly against this supposed genius. Not the other kind of memory, the bad kind, the kind with the vibrating hand of death. Nope, not at all. Not for Cisco. So he kept chewing on his twizzler as calm as you like. Yeah, that was the plan.

 

Eobard pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. "It seems that I was under the misapprehension that he grew out of it."

 

"Dude, no one grows out of this. Especially not when they're dating-," Cisco gestured with the bitten of piece of twizzler in the general direction of Eobard Thawne, formely known as Harrison Wells. Barry's teenage crush? His worst nightmare? His nemesis? His soulmate? Love of Barry's new life? Well, too many options. "Your formerly evil and newly reformed teammate?" Cisco finished lamely.

 

Eobard rolled his eyes and muttered under his breath, "five years, five years is hardly new." He returned his attention to the screen in front of him.

 

"Maybe a Valentine's heart would be appropriate?" He ventured thoughtfully.

 

Cisco shrugged. "As long as it isn't mine."

 

Eobard closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. “You're not here to help, are you?”

 

“Nope,” Cisco said and leaned back against his table. He had to take his revenge whichever way he could, in however small doses he could.


End file.
